Willo's heart was tangled with worry and frustration, but time waits for no one. She answered with a quick "Coming!" and the door to her room swung open as a familiar silhouette bounded inside.
Adele rushed in, her eyes lighting up the moment she spotted her mother resting on the bedside. "Mom, where did you go just now? I was looking everywhere for you—had to ask the nuns before I found out you'd just come back to your room."
Willo's face turned awkward. She was about to invent some excuse when Adele leaned in, her expression shifting as she gave a delicate sniff. "Mom, what's that smell on you?"
She was already picking up traces of something strange—almost like silken threads.
Willo's heart leaped in her chest, but she forced herself to act natural as she replied, "Ah, just now Miss Hattie invited me to sample some perfumes in the city—you know, the really 'sophisticated' kind."
"But those scents aren't that natural, I didn't like them much. What you're smelling is probably just the leftover fragrance."
Saying this, and not giving Adele a chance to press further, she quickly changed the subject: "But you—how come you're up and about already? You're walking around on your own?"
Adele swallowed her original question and nodded. "Yeah, it was just blood loss—nothing a little divine magic couldn't fix. I should be totally back to normal in a day or two."
Willo breathed a deep sigh of relief—she'd worried for nothing. Her daughter really was out of danger. She stood, doing her best to act casual. "If you can still smell it, I must not have rinsed the perfume off properly. I'll go clean up—oof!"
Just as she went to stand, her foot slipped and she collapsed onto Adele.
Adele caught her immediately, hugging Willo's soft body close. But in that instant, the odd feeling Adele had only grew: it wasn't just the smell, but also the sensation of her mother's skin, the bright, glossy color, and those dazed, dreamy eyes…
No way—these changes couldn't be explained by some new perfume!
"Mom, are you okay?" she asked, but Willo avoided her eyes. "I'm fine, just didn't sleep too well the past couple nights, feeling a bit weak."
But Adele was already frowning.
Once the seed of suspicion is planted, no simple brush-off can remove it. Putting her keen perception to work, Adele tried to figure out what could have caused these changes in her mom.
Weak? Anxious? That didn't sound right. If Mom had just been tired, wouldn't she look even more haggard?
Instead, her face was rosy, her gaze moist and bright. Compared to yesterday, when Adele thought back and recalled how Willo had looked, she was only more certain her suspicions were justified.
Mom was hiding something—definitely not telling the whole truth.
But… did this count as a bad thing?
Despite seeming a bit weak and wobbly, Willo looked more… radiant.
Radiant?
Adele didn't know why that word popped into her head. But looking at her mother's sparkling eyes and glowing skin, she couldn't find a better description for her current state.
If it's a good thing… why was she suddenly this changed overnight?
What happened last night?
Noticing her daughter deep in suspicious thought, Willo grew even more frantic inside and tried to patch things up. "Let me just rest a bit—don't worry, Mommy's fine, really. Don't overthink it…"
But the more she said, the more uneasy Adele became.
Just what could possibly make her hide this from her only daughter?
Still, Adele smoothed her expression and flashed an angelic, innocent smile. "Then let me help you get washed up, okay?"
Thinking she'd finally dodged a bullet, Willo relaxed. Meanwhile, Adele's eyes sharpened, her brain spinning furiously.
Even though she trusted her mother's health—mind and body seemed fine—there's just no way she could let this drop!
What happened last night? What changed?
I'm going to find out everything!
No one… no one but me is allowed to mess with my mom!
Her heart brimmed with fierce determination, not once considering that the truth might be harder for her young, innocent soul to handle than she could imagine…
...
Meanwhile, down in the sewers, inside Xanathar's secret lair, in the beholder's private chambers—
Several of Xanathar's senior enforcers stood anxiously outside the boss's door. Even though their knowledge of magic was patchy at best, they could feel the terror bubbling within.
Unending waves of Chaotic Energy crashed out even through the stone walls, making everyone present deeply uncomfortable. Muffled shrieks, wild laughter, and weeping drifted from within, like something straight out of the darkest legends.
"This is…" The halfling assassin's lips trembled. "Is… is everything really going to be alright?"
The Dark Elf's face was ghastly pale. Even though, as a male, drow society denied him the chance to formally learn magic, he'd picked up a thing or two over the years.
And thanks to his devotion to the Spider Queen and regular dealings with demons, he was sure: this was the birth of something powerful—and evil.
"This is bad news," he murmured. "That Mind Flayer is no good. If Lord Xanathar crashes and burns, it's on us. We can't just split the loot and run—we've got to keep the Guild running."
Everyone else nodded, anxiety etching lines across their faces. If Xanathar—the original founder and strongest power-holder in the Guild—bit the dust, would they even stand a chance of maintaining its sprawling operation?
Then, all at once, the tidal wave of Chaotic Energy vanished. The unnerving screams or sobs fell instantly silent, plunging the sewers into a silence so deep you could hear a pin drop. It was as if nothing had ever happened at all.
A moment later, a strange voice echoed from within the room: "You lot standing out there, come in."
The gathered few exchanged wary glances, then gripped their weapons and spell foci, sinking into fighting stance.
A beholder's dream could spawn nearly anything—including its own monstrous offspring. Those creations ranged in strength, alignment, and abilities according only to the madness or clarity of the dream.
So, after sensing such wild, surging Chaotic Energy, nobody wanted to bet the figure calling them in was still "their" Xanathar.
Ready for a fight, they lined up. In front, a human male in black plate armor shoved the door open and burst inside.
There they saw the beholder itself, floating in midair—its enormous central eye and several eyestalks locked squarely on them. "What are you doing? Planning a mutiny?"
For a beat, everyone hesitated, then slowly put away their weapons and assumed a more relaxed posture, all coming to the same relieved—but uneasy—conclusion.
Good news: Xanathar was alive.
Bad news: it definitely looked… "off."
Neither its central eye nor the eyes on its eight main eyestalks were the familiar, pupil-dilated black orbs—now, they had morphed into vertical, snake-like golden or green slits, far more chilling and sinister than before.
Everyone who knew Xanathar could see it. And everyone felt the same, sinking dread.
After a long beat, the Halfling Wanderer—traditionally the one closest to Xanathar—stepped forward. "My lord… what happened to your eyes?"
"I'm fine!" Xanathar shot back, its already-shrill voice even sharper. "Do your jobs. Don't ask questions you don't need answers to!"
Nobody dared say a thing more. The sense of looming disaster only thickened in their chests.
Then, before anyone could recover, Xanathar issued its next command: "Fetch me some blood—make sure it's from something freshly killed, no more than twenty-four hours ago, and greatly weakened!"
The request was outrageous, but no one was foolish enough to argue. They exchanged wary looks, then hustled out to obey.
Back in the chamber, Xanathar hovered in place. After a moment, a tall, thin Mind Flayer emerged from another door, chin-tentacles twitching with worry over the beholder's condition.
But right now, Xanathar didn't even acknowledge him—didn't engage in psychic speech, didn't so much as discuss the last experiment. Instead, it kept twitching its mouth in an eerie, almost fevered mumble:
"So that's it… the weak ones… heh heh…"
~~~
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